


Open Up My Eager Eyes

by Haberdasher



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Archivist Jonathan Sims, Canon Compliant, Communication, Crying, Episode Related, Episode: e168 Roots (The Magnus Archives), Jealous Martin Blackwood, Jealousy, Jonathan "Jon" Sims | The Archivist Needs a Hug, Kissing, M/M, Men Crying, Nightmares, POV Jonathan "Jon" Sims | The Archivist, Post-Episode: e168 Roots (The Magnus Archives), Referenced Death Wish, Spoilers for Episode 168: Roots, Talking, What-If, referenced suicidal ideation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-22
Updated: 2020-05-22
Packaged: 2021-03-03 01:20:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,077
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24326419
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Haberdasher/pseuds/Haberdasher
Summary: Just after MAG 168, Jon and Martin have an important talk about what once was and what might have been.
Relationships: Martin Blackwood/Jonathan "Jon" Sims | The Archivist
Comments: 28
Kudos: 212





	Open Up My Eager Eyes

They didn’t speak much right after Jon returned, but the tension in the air was palpable as they made their way forwards, the only sounds that of their footsteps crunching against what passed for ground here and the whispers of the dying.

Eventually, Jon couldn’t stand it anymore, so he stopped walking, turning towards Martin as he said, “Can we... let’s talk.”

“About _what_?” Martin’s tone was a little sharp, but he stood still as well, looking Jon in the eye as he did so.

“You know, the whole jealousy thing.”

Martin’s face tensed up, and he made a show of breaking eye contact with Jon as he said, “I think we’ve talked quite enough about that already, thanks.”

“No, not... look, we already discussed how you’re jealous of Oliver Banks for, for some reason, and how I’m not going to kill a man just because you’re jealous of him-”

Martin scrunched up his nose in a way that would be patently adorable if he wasn’t currently trying to convince Jon to murder someone. “He’s not really a _man_ anymore, though, is he? I mean, that’s kind of the _point_.”

“Martin, if just being an avatar of a fear god during, well, _this_ , is enough for somebody to deserve getting killed in your mind... I’d like you to think a bit about what that implies about _me_.”

Martin blinked a few times and furrowed his brow, thinking for a few seconds in silence before letting out a long, solemn breath. “Alright, yeah, point taken.”

“Besides, if you just let me explain what actually happened, maybe you’ll understand that there’s really no reason for you to be jealous of...” Jon tried to hold back the laughter in his voice, but a bit of it sneaked through just the same as he finished, “...of _Oliver Banks_ , of all people.”

“I mean, you _did_ wake up for him and not for me, though. That’s just a _fact_.”

“It wasn’t... it wasn’t for him, is the thing. Because of him, maybe, but not _for_ him.”

“Fine, _because_ of him, then. But he- he still did something for you there, then. Something I clearly couldn’t.”

Jon threw his hands in the air. “Yes, because he was an avatar of death! Look, if you’re really that desperate to throw away your humanity, feel free to give Annabelle Cane a ring, I’m sure she’d be glad to hook you up-”

“Jon...”

“I... It was a joke. I was joking.” That wasn’t entirely accurate, truth be told--Jon kept wondering if that was Annabelle Cane’s endgame in all of this, recruiting Martin to her side--but that was a very different conversation to be had than the current one, and not one Jon terribly felt like delving into at the moment.

“Sure.” Martin sounded less than convinced.

“It’s not like I- I cared more about Oliver Banks than you, or anything like that, if that’s what you’re thinking! He just... let me know what I needed to do to wake up. Gave me information I had been lacking.”

“I thought you knew _everything_!”

“Now, maybe. And there’s still a few limits even now. But back then it... it wasn’t quite that simple.”

“So, what was this information he had and you didn’t?”

“He explained that, that what had happened... it left me trapped somewhere in between life and death-”

“You couldn’t have figured that much out for yourself?”

“Let me finish! At the time, I was... how did he phrase it... not human enough to die, but still too human to live. And I had to make a choice. Either I could pick my human side and just- just _die_ , or I could give up on being human and wake up as a full-fledged avatar of the Beholding.”

“And you chose the latter?”

“I’m still here, aren’t I?” Jon let out a sharp bark of a laugh, looking around at the desolate, nightmarish landscape surrounding them before adding, “Knowing what I do now... I don’t think I made the right choice there.”

“Don’t say that!” Jon hadn’t been expecting the desperation in Martin’s voice, hadn’t been expecting him to reach out and clutch Jon’s arm as if he were going to fade away at any moment. “Don’t... don’t you dare say you want to die, alright?”

Martin looked like he was on the verge of tears, suddenly, and Jon pressed one hand against his cheek, ready to brush away any teardrops that might fall. “I mean, I don’t want to die _now,_ I’m not suicidal. At this point, the damage has already been done. Dying now wouldn’t do anyone much good.”

Martin released his grip on Jon’s arm, but that sad, desperate look in his eyes remained all too present. “But you still think the world would be better off if you had died back then.”

“I mean...” Jon used his free hand to gesture towards the hellscape that surrounded them. “If I had, none of this would have happened. And the rest of the Archives staff would be free to leave, to escape from this mess. _You_ would be free, Martin. Free to live your life without having to worry about any of this.”

“But without you.”

“Without me, and without being tied to an eldritch fear god, and without the apocalypse unfolding in front of you. That seems like more than a fair trade-off.”

Martin laughed, but it was a laugh more of sorrow than of levity, and Jon felt a single teardrop fall onto his finger. “After all this time, you still don’t get it, do you?”

“Get what?”

“None of that matters to me if you’re not there. The only reason my working with Peter Lukas became more than just- just a death wish was because you woke up, because I could see a life for myself outside of the Lonely with you. Maybe it’s selfish--no, strike that, I _know_ it’s selfish--but I’d rather be beside you here and now than in a world where none of this happened, but you’re not there to share it with me.”

“...thank you, Martin.” Jon broke into a shaky smile. “But even if you’re fine with how things worked out, the others-”

“-are better off with you here too.”

Jon let the hand that had been pressed against Martin’s face fall to his side, tried not to focus on how it was now shaking due to some emotion he couldn’t quite name. “I don’t see how that works.”

“Alright, let’s go through this one by one. If you hadn’t woken up, Melanie would still have a- a ghost bullet from the Slaughter stuck in her leg, right?”

“That she wanted in there!”

Martin rolled his eyes. “Right, because _that’s_ healthy. Look, I’m not saying the way you went about things was the perfect solution, but I do think it beats doing nothing and just letting her become an avatar of unthinking violence. And if you’d died, she’d have had to find another target for all that rage...”

“...fine, let’s say for the sake of argument Melanie’s better off. There’s Basira, too.”

“Basira...” Martin bit his lip for a moment the way he often did when he was deep in thought. “I’m not sure what she would have done if you had died, honestly, but I do know she wouldn’t have gotten Daisy back without you. You’re the reason she knew Daisy was in the Buried, and you’re definitely the reason Daisy got out of there.”

“Because I jumped into a coffin where the whole idea is that once you go in, you can never come out.”

“Again, not claiming it was a great plan or anything, but it did work. You saved Basira from not knowing what really happened, from mourning a woman who was still alive. And you saved Daisy from being stuck in the Buried literally forever.”

“And now she’s succumbed to the Hunt. I can’t imagine that’s much better.”

“You were down there with her. You tell me.”

Jon’s silence as he considered this was as much of a response as any words could have been.

“Basira might have stayed, too. It’s not like she had anything left outside the Archives, after all. And if she did? Maybe I would have actually gone along with Peter’s plan and killed Elias-” Jon gave Martin a look, and Martin corrected himself. “Killed Jonah Magnus, and then she would have died. Along with everybody else who works for the Institute. Rosie from the front desk, who always greets everyone with a smile? Dead. Sonja from Artefact Storage, who actually seems to accept all of this weirdness? Dead. Hannah’s children would lose their mother. Hundreds of families would be torn apart.”

“That’s still a lot less pain and suffering than I caused by reading that damn statement. You can’t claim the world wouldn’t be better off if I hadn’t done that.”

“Okay, no, I’m not gonna come out pro-apocalypse here or anything, but... think about it. Jonah Magnus was planning all of this for two hundred years. You really think he would have given up if you died?”

Jon hadn’t thought of that, and his vision blurred as he considered the implications there.

“He would’ve found another Archivist, he would’ve made _them_ go through hell instead, and we’d end up back here soon enough. The only way he would’ve stopped is if I killed him, a-and then Peter’d have the Panopticon for whatever the hell he really wanted it for, and maybe it’s not the same, but you can’t tell me a world under Peter Lukas’ control would really be that much better.”

“...I suppose not, no.” Jon cleared his throat as he prepared to change the subject as smoothly as he could manage. “So. Oliver Banks did what he had to do, as did I, whatever the consequences. And I’m pretty sure either option of his choice would be better than being eternally stuck watching other people’s nightmares. You’ve seen for yourself that those can be... rough on me, and that’s after just one night.”

“ _That’s_ what it was like? Just- just six months of nonstop nightmares?”

And suddenly Martin’s arms were wrapped around Jon’s body, Martin tucking his head against Jon’s shoulder, and he could feel tears dampening his jumper. Jon did his best to reciprocate, to reach out to Martin in turn, and tears of his own began to fall as well.

“I’m sorry you had to go through that, Jon.”

“It’s fine-”

Martin looked up at Jon with a fiery gaze. “It’s _not_ fine.”

“Well, it’s fine _now_. And- and maybe now you can see why I’m grateful to Oliver Banks for letting me know that I had options besides being stuck like that forever.”

“...yeah, I guess so. Though I still wish I could have been the one to help you.”

“I know you did everything you could.” Jon’s lips turned into a wry smile as he added, “I heard you, you know. The only other things I heard were statements--Oliver’s and Jonah’s, and please don’t tell me you’re going to be jealous of _Jonah Magnus_ now-”

“Nah, I think we’ve got better reasons for killing him than that.”

“Quite.” Jon snorted. “But I heard you, at one point, too. Not a statement, of course. Just... you, talking to me. Begging me to come back. And I wanted to, I really did. But at that point, I didn’t know _how_.”

“...I didn’t know you heard any of that.”

“Well, we never really talked about it before. Understandably so; it’s not exactly the most pleasant of conversation topics.”

Jon leaned over, tilting his head just so before planting a kiss on Martin’s damp cheek.

“I’ve also never done _that_ to Oliver Banks, so hopefully that will help you get over that jealousy of yours.”

Martin’s eyes were sparkling as he looked up at Jon, and only partially due to the half-formed tears still lingering in his eyes. “Hmm... I don’t know. Might need to give it a few more tries just to be sure.”

Jon raised an eyebrow as he broke into a wide grin, though he tried to keep his voice calm and level and faux-academic. “Ah, a firm believer in the scientific method. I can certainly respect that.”

And Jon kissed Martin again, and again, and again, until the kissing dissolved into a mutual fit of giggles and both their tears were well and truly gone.

**Author's Note:**

> If you liked this, consider following me on tumblr at [haberdashing](https://haberdashing.tumblr.com/)!


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